INDIANAPOLIS — Expanding Indiana's voucher system and beginning to fund pre-kindergarten are the central planks of an education legislative agenda being driven by Gov. Mike Penceand House leaders.
The two proposals would add to the changes the Republican-dominated General Assembly initiated in 2011 when it created private school vouchers for low-income Hoosier families.
One measure would eliminate the requirement that students spend at least a year in public schools before they can receive tax dollars to attend private schools. It would make vouchers available regardless of family income to children of military veterans, special needs students and foster children.
That bill would also give Hoosiers $1 back in tax credits for every $2 they donate to organizations that provide pre-kindergarten scholarships — a move that would mark the first time Indiana pumped state tax money into those programs.
The second measure would set aside $7 million a year for a two-year pre-kindergarten pilot program. That's enough to pay tuition costs for about 1,000 children from low-income families, House Speaker Brian Bosma said.
Both bills are being carried by House Education Committee Chairman Robert Behning, R-Indianapolis. He said they tie Pence's ideas in with goals that he and Bosma, another Indianapolis Republican, hope to achieve.
"All three of us are interested in the needs of students and believe that choice is one of the best ways to incentivize improvements in education," Behning said.
Pence was silent about his legislative agenda on Thursday, suggesting that Hoosiers "stay tuned" for his State of the State address next week.
But Behning said the governor asked him to carry legislation that includes the pre-kindergarten tax credit and the voucher expansion to children of military veterans as well as foster and special needs children.
He said doing away with the required one year in public school to qualify for a voucher is an idea he and Bosma both support, and that the $7 million pre-kindergarten pilot program is broadly backed by House Republican leaders.
Bosma said Thursday he hopes the program — which would cover a small sliver of the 81,000 or so children who would meet the income requirements to participate — puts students "in a better position to be prepared when they reach kindergarten and first grade."
The voucher expansion could be the most controversial of the education proposals. Behning originally did not include the year in public school requirement in the bill he filed in 2011, but it was added to quell the concerns of Republican fiscal hawks and lessen Democratic opposition.
"You're actually incentivizing parents to pull children out of a (private) school that they feel is meeting their students' needs, put them in public school, and put them back," Behning said of the current law.
The vouchers are worth $4,500 annually for elementary school students, and a little more than that for older students.
Sen. Carlin Yoder, R-Middlebury, introduced a bill that would allow the siblings of students who are receiving vouchers to also qualify without also spending a year in a public school.
But that proposal drew the ire of Senate Appropriations Committee Chairman Luke Kenley, R-Noblesville, who said vouchers were aimed at students whose public schools weren't meeting their needs.
Senate Education and Career Development Committee Chairman Dennis Kruse, R-Auburn, said last week that he does not anticipate "a lot of changes made in the voucher law" during the General Assembly's four-month 2013 session.